Cora turns down food?!?!?!?!

So Cora just spent her first day in the "next room up" which Carrie and I have called the "big kids room". Being the newest member of the "2's room" she is naturally the youngest in the class. Of course Carrie and I have already started comparing her to the older kids to, in any way, find a superior skill(s) that would thus confirm our suspicion that Cora is in fact a savant and well on her way to taking over the world. Although we didn't witness any significant advantages in the ten minutes we spent in the room, when dropping her off, I do believe that she picked something up from her older classmates.

Last night at dinner with Eric and Cora, I offered Cora some ice cream cake left over from Eric's birthday party. The response I got was one I'd never seen before. We found it quite funny! Although it scares the day lights out of me because this is evidence that she is absorbing everything. Carrie and I will be on our best behavior for the next twenty years or so. :)

I hope you enjoyed my first post. - Landon

Cora's first flight

With Mommy, to Aunt Bum's Bachelorette party in Kentucky (Cora stayed with Mom and Matt and crew in Cincy).

Waiting for our flight out of Charleston.

Waiting for our flight back to Charleston.

I would act surprised that I didn't get a pic in flight... but it was just me traveling with Cora.
It is not at all surprising that I was not able to get a picture. Cora was a handful.

A toy couldn't be this much fun

I was looking for a baby shower card this week, and came across this quote:

"You're new baby will have many toys... but none of them will be as fun as Daddy".

The card was meant to be funny; it made me immediately teary.

We are so lucky.

 Cora grabbed Landon by his hair and pulled him up to a sitting position. She would not allow him to take this play session lying down.

 And this was apparently the game that she was positioning...
 She likes him to form a tunnel...

 So that she can crawl all the way through...

 And then she wants to do it again!

A similar family wrestling match or game of catch happens nearly every single day at our house.


A few more from the weekend.

 I've had some bubbles in the kitchen for months (Jamie Allison brought them when she was here in July), but for some reason, I've never pulled them out. Today, I did. Huge hit with Cora.

 And, Pearl was pretty intrigued, too.

Cora is never happy to leave the park. Landon was trying to distract her with a shoulder ride. It didn't work - when she realized we were approaching the car, she kicked and screamed all the way back to Pitt Street.

For our very hungry caterpillar, it is always Saturday

If you've read The Very Hungry Caterpillar lately (and, chances are, if you are someone who reads this blog, then you are also someone who has The Very Hungry Caterpillar memorized...), then you know the rundown:

On Monday he ate throuh one apple.
On Tuesday he ate through two pears.
On Wednesday he ate through three plums.
On Thursday he ate through four strawberries.
On Friday he ate through five oranges.
On Saturday he ate through one piece of chocolate cake, one ice-cream cone, one pickle, one slice of swiss cheese, one slice of salami, one lollipop, one piece of cherry pie, one sausage, one cupcake, and one slice of watermelon.

Cora's cuddle grams from daycare read much like the caterpillar's Saturday.
For example, I saved her cards from this week...

On Monday, Cora ate a waffle, a Yo-Baby yogurt, cheese, ham, fruit cocktail, grapes (from home), applesauce, and a vanilla wafer.
On Tuesday, Cora had milk, mashed potatoes, veggies, meatballs, graham crackers, yogurt, and a vanilla wafer.
On Wednesday, Cora had a corn dog, broccolli, banana pudding, milk, ritz, fruit, banana, cheese, and a hot dog.
On Thursday, Cora had cheese, grapes, milk, a tuna cake, some asparagus, yogurt, and grapes.
On Friday, Cora had a slice of pizza, grapes, applesauce, green beans, sandwich slices, a vanilla wafer, and some cheese.

This doesn't include the breakfast we feed her, and then the dinner that she eats at home. We have our very own hungry caterpillar.

Here, our caterpillar is eating asparagus & tuna-corn cakes.

I uploaded some pics from my phone today, and wasn't surprised to see that so many of these involved Cora eating. I'm telling you - she LOVES to eat. She starts to get fussy in the 20 minutes before it is time for her to eat (often pushing my legs away from the cabinets as I am trying to make dinner), and she either runs straight for her high chair when we mention that it is time to eat or she immediately reaches to be picked-up (she seems to know all of the words for eating: "Let's go get some dinner", "It's time for breakfast", "Let's have a banana"). On Saturday, she and I went grocery shopping. When we got home, I was unloading the groceries and Cora was running around our house with one of her baby spoons (I'm not sure why). She went to one of the bags, pulled out a 4-pack of YoBaby Yogurt, sat down and began working one of the yogurts free, and then started trying to shove her spoon through the plastic seal. I guess she wanted some yogurt? (she immediately was rewarded with a YoBaby, of course).

I think that these are Kix - that was a little phase this summer. I'm not sure how good they are for her, but the old commercials worked on me. I remember standing in the grocery store debating whether I could substitute Kix for her Baby Puffs (kind of like cheerios for babies, in case you haven't heard of Puffs), and I thought, "They can't be that unhealthy. Kid tested, mother approved").

Rice? I'm not sure what this was. She looks so little here!

Mixed veggies - always a huge hit with Cora.

OK, I have no clue what she was eating here...

I am also not sure what this is...

 Spaghetti, maybe with a little ham and cheese mixed in as an appetizer?

Noodles. I think that we were having noodles with pesto this evening.

Potatoes, corn, and roast, I believe. An attempt to use the spoon (Landon and I have been a little hot and cold with reinforcing utensils).

Loving some Saturday morning blackberries.

 And, loving some Sunday afternoon pineapple.

Cora has a reputation at daycare. Anytime someone new comes along to take care of the kids, or if one of the other teachers fills-in in Cora's room, one of the first things that they say to me at the end of the day is, "Wow! Cora really likes to eat!" Today, I was chatting with Miss Linda, who prepares the food for Miss Aimee's. She mentioned that she sometimes has to sit and coax other kids to eat, but not Cora, "She loves everything!" Recently, another mom in the baby room (the room that Cora used to be in) asked one of the teachers about introducing food. The teacher said that her response was, "Talk to Cora's mom and do whatever she did. Cora eats everything".

Everything? Not quiet. Of the list of items for the hungry caterpillar's Saturday, Cora is not a huge fan of pickles and as far as I know she has never had cherry pie. Otherwise, everything else on the list is something that she has at least tried, mostly likes (she loves salami and sausage!), and would try again, if we let her (the lollipop was daddy's controversial idea on Halloween). She usually doesn't like bland meats (like plain chicken or turkey), but stick it in a casserole or add a tomato sauce to it (like with meatballs), she'll eat it. She goes for almost every veggie (even beets, which we don't eat, but her Aunt Heather does), and the only fruit I've ever seen her turn down are oranges.

All of that said, we may have started a bad eating trend today. For the first time, in the history of our relationship as far as either of us can remember...

Landon and I...

And Cora...

(Not on a roadtrip)...

Ate fastfood.

Taco Bell, to be precise, for dinner. Landon's pregnant craving, not mine. He specifically woke today with Taco Bell on his mind.

We NEVER eat fast food. Even when on road trips, Landon and I are more likely to stop at a Cracker Barrell or a Ruby Tuesday or a Chinese buffet instead of having fast food, and when we do have fast food when traveling, it is almost always fast food of a healthy variety (e.g., Subway or Arby's or KFC where Cora can get some veggies, or Wendy's where I have a salad followed by a Frosty, of course). I admit we do have an obsession with Dairy Queen (plain cup of vanilla for me, Oreo Blizzard with extra Oreo for Landon) when traveling. But, I can honestly count on one hand the number of times that Landon and I without any guests have ordered take-out pizza for dinner. In fact, our trip to Taco Bell was monumental today because in the history of our relationship, even when we were dating, except for the occassional road trip, neither Landon or I have any other recollection of walking into a fast food establishment for a meal. And, I would estimate that our ratio of choosing a local restaurant to a chain restaurant is 10:1.

The food was not very good, and I am happily returning to my life as a fast food and chain restaurant snob. The next time he says he has a Taco Bell craving, I'm insisting that we drive straight to our Mexican favorite, La Hacienda!

Elves and Goldfish

This past weekend, we were fortunate to have an early visit from a Christmas Elf. The Elf wasn't dressed in red, she is 11, loves to try on dresses and jewelry, is into "Say Yes to the Dress", and is learning to play Gin Rummy.

The elf is our very own Elf Ellie (our niece).

All weekend long, Cora was entertained, I had an extra set of hands, and I had a partner for cards during the football game. Ellie even "babysat" Cora at the James Island Connector Run so Landon and I could volunteer. Life was pretty darn good.

On Sunday, we had a funny Cora moment. We were all sitting at the kitchen table eating biscuits. The Looney Tunes were on the Cartoon Network in the background. While eating, Cora started squealing and craning her neck to see the TV. She was reaching her arms (as if to say Hello), and she had turned on her flirty face. The subject of her affection: The Goldfish Commercial. There is a commercial on kids' channels for Pepperidge Farm Goldfish (I think it is specifically advertising for Goldfish Grahams). The goldfish are nearly the size of the TV screen and they are bright and animated. My child loved it! We've seen it a few times since, and she always stops what she is doing and reacts. This was her first "fan" moment. Although we watch Looney Tunes in the mornings and we sometimes put in a Smurfs DVD, we really do not have any shows that we put on for Cora (you are right - that means that we are watching Looney Tunes and Smurfs for Landon and I), but she doesn't seem any more attracted to the Looney Tunes than she does to a football game. I guess that we just don't watch a lot of TV at our house, and we certainly haven't started encouraging Cora to watch TV. But the goldfish - that was something entirely different!

An Ellie-ism that left us cackling.

We were driving, and a song comes on a country music station. Ellie pipes up with "Turn it up! This is one of my favorite songs!" The song was Ole Red (about a man going to prison because his wife cheated on him and he killed the man she cheated with, and then he escaped from prison after he trained the prison guard dog to fall in love with a pretty hound dog he kept up in the woods). Now that's funny!

There was also a description of her feelings about Red Lobster and other equally funny Ellie moments, but I'll keep those between us. If you've been around Ellie, then you already know how much we enjoyed having her here!

A few pics from the weekend.